Habitat preferences and feeding behaviour of Speckled mousebird (Colius striatus) in urban sub- Saharan Africa: the case study from Cameroon

Forests and other intact areas within the tropics are nowadays in the main focus of researchers and little or no attention is paid to urban sub-Saharan environments justifying the need for gathering baseline data. It is important to understand urban bird species ecology and uncover its interactions with city people. Speckled mousebird (SM, Colius striatus ) is one of the most common species in rural and urban areas within man-made environments. We systematically sampled 222 random count points in Dschang (West Cameroon) using binoculars within buffers of a 50 m radius around count points for 10 minutes two times during the period September-November 2022. The population density reached 1.33 inds./ha and its distribution largely followed random pattern. The presence of SM was positively correlated with abundance of fruiting trees, the most important was percentage of guava ( Psidium guajava ) and papaya ( Carica papaya ) tree. Similarly, the presence of SM was positively linked to human population size since it often occurred within mosaic agriculture areas and near dwellings. Percentage of feeding time was increased around garbage sites due to increased availability of nutrients for fruiting trees there. We further found a positive relationship between the percentage of feeding time and temperature and increased number of vocal interactions around garbage sites. Finally, the number of vocal interactions decreased with Julian date to protect nestlings against predators. Our results showed that interaction of SM with human was a significant driver for SM distribution within the study area.